Hi All-
I'm new to the list here... so, hi!!
Likewise, am new to this thread, and probably am missing earlier
posts on it- but wanted to poke at one point below... why/how is it
that aesthetics qualify as "baggage?"
No, they're not relevant to the structural nature of how information
is dispersed for intuitive accessed across a complete site/database/
whatever, but they are rather critical to guiding interaction and the
intuitive nature of how a user's experience is "guided" by visuals;
branding and 'prettiness,' as total asides...
Happy Friday, and nice to meet y'all,
:) nina
http://www.kickingpebbles.net/?cat=22
On Aug 8, 2008, at 10:55 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Yes, "design" has a lot of baggage related to aesthetics. But I
don't see
why Godin thinks "architecture" is any better -- among many people
(such
as our friend Mr Malouf), it carries ample unintended meaning. The IA
community has struggled with this albatross for quite a while.
What I find helpful in Godin's point is that it's sometimes helpful
to use
words with a different nuance of meaning in order to remind us (or
clients?) of what we're *really* doing in some point of design. It
can
help re-orient or re-frame the effort, in a given context.
I blogged about this just the other day, in fact -- I was thinking
about
how the word "inhabit" gives a different depth to what users do in a
digital space, as opposed to "use" or "experience." But "use" and
"experience" are still excellent words nearly all the time.
Maybe the point is that we use whatever language (just like we use
whatever tool) is best, in the moment, for getting the work right?
(btw my blog post was here:
http://www.inkblurt.com/2008/08/05/words-we-use-for-what-we-make/)
---
Andrew Hinton
"Will Evans" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent by: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
08/07/2008 09:17 AM
To
"IXDA list" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
cc
Subject
[IxDA Discuss] Designing vs. Architecting
So Seth Godin has a new blog post <http://tinyurl.com/6rqluo>
concerning
the
semantics of designing. vs. architecting which is rather interesting.
Here is what he says --
Is architect a verb?
"I confess. I like using it that way.
I think architecting something is different from designing it. I
hope you
can forgive me but I think it's a more precise way to express this
idea.
Design carries a lot of baggage related to aesthetics. We say
something is
well-designed if it looks good. There are great designs that don't
look
good, certainly, but it's really easy to get caught up in a
bauhaus, white
space, font-driven, Ideo-envy way of thinking about design.
So I reserve "architect" to describe the intentional arrangement of
design
elements to get a certain result.
You can architect a computer server set up to make it more
efficient. You
can architect a train station to get more people per minute through
the
turnstiles.
More interesting, you can architect a business model or a pricing
structure
to make it far more effective at generating the behavior you're
looking
for.
Most broken websites aren't broken because they violate common laws of
good
design. They're broken because their architecture is all wrong.
There's no
strategy in place.
Stew Leonard's, which used to be my favorite supermarket example, is
architected to extract large amounts of money from customers. One
example:
there's only one route through the store. You start at the
beginning and
work your way to the end. No one goes there to buy a half-gallon of
milk.
And he's not going to win any design competitions either...
Or consider the architecture of the pricing at
37signals<http://www.37signals.com/>or the architecture of Hotmail's
viral marketing campaign years ago.
Architecture, for me anyway, involves intention, game theory, systems
thinking and relentless testing and improvement. Fine with me if
you want
to
call it design, just don't forget to do it."
--
~ will
"Where you innovate, how you innovate,
and what you innovate are design problems"
----------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------
Will Evans | User Experience Architect
tel +1.617.281.1281 | [EMAIL PROTECTED]
twitter: https://twitter.com/semanticwill
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